Thursday, June 13, 2013

Getting some fun out of life

I'm not going to lie. Things have been a bit rough around the edges lately. We have reached the six week mark and along with it, the sixth week growth spurt. If you've never nursed, this entry from a fellow blogger sums it up fairly well, although I think the writer brings a little more sweetness and humour to the situation than I've been able to bring into my own experience this week. My perspective has been somewhat skewed by the fact that half the household is sick. Luckily, Cally and I aren't in the sicky half. Yet. But for the last three days she has stopped nursing only long enough to be burped (i.e. 10 minute intervals max) - for hours - and Taran can't be anywhere near Cally. Neither can Joe. As a consequence Taran is not only a mess because he's sick and is constantly being dragged away from his sister, but also has very little access to me. "I want you to put her in the bassinet", I've heard about a million times this week. Yesterday I walked around the house pant-less for hours with spit-up down my bra, gazing longingly at everyone else's plates of food with no hands to eat my own and wishing desperately I could take a shower. So you know, it's been a barrel of laughs around these parts.

Even prior to the nasty virus, we have been on the bumpy road of adjustment to being a foursome. Mainly we've just been hunkering down at home and trying to get to some semblance of normalcy back around here. As Taran would say, we are snuggling in the womb.

Taran: This is my womb
Me: This is a gigantic, random pile of junk that I dread straightening up

One thing that has helped is to have some family projects.... gardening, cooking, crafting.... something mellow that we can do together, puttering around the house at our own pace.

A couple of weeks ago, to give Taran some special solo time with me, I hopped in the bath with him. On a whim, I picked up one of his bath toys and started to play the didgeridoo on it. Taran lit up, so after the bath we found a didgeridoo video on youtube and now we are all hooked. A couple of weeks ago we all went out and picked up some pvc pipe, beeswax, acrylic paint and some gyros at the drive-thru (who thought up this brilliant set-up?!) and then set out to make our didgeridoo, or as Taran calls it a "didgawarydoo". I had a number of photos of the process, but they all seemed disturbingly phallic, so I'll just show you the finished product - non-traditional colors and all.

This morning, on top of the endless snot, we are also having endless rain. So we made play dough face collages with beads, buttons, yarn, tissue paper and various other random doodads. Taran has been channeling Picasso I guess on this particular project.

On one particularly beautiful morning last week, we decided to rally and venture outside the home to check out a non-profit educational organic farm. Aside from a few minor meltdowns, in our own ways, we all had a fantastic time. Cally was soothed by the warm sun and fresh air

Taran had a great time wandering through the tall grass and exploring the old farm equipment

and Joe and I? Well, we have been dreaming of expanding our backyard "farm" ever since.

We have various chicken coop plans sketched out on scrap paper strewn about the house and I'm dreaming of Araucanas and blue eggs. We've been talking about this for four years and I'm really hoping that the scheme comes to fruition this summer. In all our free time.

And overall, how's Cally doing you might ask? She's amazing! She has almost doubled her birth weight in 6 weeks and has practically outgrown most of her 0-3 month clothes.

She's a real chunk-a-munk with a super sweet temperament and besides her love of eating, she seems to be a big fan of sleeping too (insert a big cheerleader "Hurrah" here). On some nights she has "slept through the night" (i.e. 11:30-5:30) while Taran has run in on multiple occasions. Clearly he could take some sleeping tips from his baby sister.

Overall, despite the chaos of this week, I would have to say things are settling down. I no longer feel like body-snatchers have captured our son. He's started to settle in and show glimpses of his happy self. And while Joe and I have no sense of a routine yet, we find ourselves shaking our heads in amazement on how we managed to have two such wonderful kiddos. Life is good. And even fun once in a while these days.

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About Me

I'm a wish-I-could-stay-at-home, stay-at-home-more-often-than-I-should Mom. Technically I am a 3rd year postdoctoral research fellow in mathematical ecology. Most of the time I'd rather play with my kid than do my research. This doesn't bode well for my future career. Ha! I guess currently I'm just stumbling through life trying to sort out how I can combine my love and enthusiasm for learning with my love of family, food, and exploration.